Republicans Talk Pot

“We’re losing badly the war on drugs. You have to legalize drugs to win that war. You have to take the profit away from these drug czars….What I’d like to do maybe by bringing it up is cause enough controversy that you get into a dialogue on the issue of drugs and you start to realize that this is the only answer; there is no other answer.”

– Donald Trump

“I think we need to enforce our federal laws. Now do states have a right to do what they want? They have their rights. But they don’t have a right to write federal policy. I don’t believe we should be in the business of legalizing additional intoxicants in this country. When you legalize something, you’re sending a message to young people that it can’t be that bad, if it was that bad, it wouldn’t be legal.”

– Marco Rubio

“If I’m at a wedding reception here and somebody has a drink or two, most people wouldn’t say they’re wasted. Most folks with marijuana wouldn’t be sitting around a wedding reception smoking marijuana. Now there are people who abuse (alcohol), no doubt about it, but I think it’s a big jump between someone having a beer and smoking marijuana.”

– Scott Walker

“There’s a big push on to legalize marijuana. Backers like to compare pot favorably to tobacco or heroin by saying that marijuana never killed anyone. They just completed a study of fatal car crashes in six states. Five of them have legalized medical marijuana. If you drive in Colorado or Washington, buckle your seat belt and keep your eyes peeled for old VW vans.”

– Mike Huckabee

“Look, the last two presidents could conceivably have been put in jail for their drug use, and I really think, you know, what would have happened? It’d have ruined their lives. They got lucky, but a lot of poor kids, particularly in the inner city, don’t. They don’t have good attorneys, and they go to jail for these things and I think it’s a big mistake. I don’t want to put them in jail and ruin their lives.”

– Rand Paul

“Florida leaders and citizens have worked for years to make the Sunshine State a world-class location to start or run a business, a family-friendly destination for tourism and a desirable place to raise a family or retire. Allowing large-scale, marijuana operations to take root across Florida, under the guise of using it for medicinal purposes, runs counter to all these efforts.”

– Jeb Bush

“For the people who are enamored with the idea, with the income, the tax revenue from this, See if you want to live in a major city in Colorado where there’s head shops popping up on every corner and people flying into your airport just to come and get high. To me, it’s not the quality of life we want to have here in the state of New Jersey and there’s no tax revenue worth that.”

– Chris Christie

“Well, I’m a big believer in the 10th Amendment. I don’t agree with those decisions that were made by the state of Colorado or Washington, but I will defend it to my death to allow them to make those decisions. I think I’m closer to Ted [Cruz] there than I am to Chris [Christie]. These decisions need to be made in the states. I defend the right of Colorado to be wrong on that issue.”